Who Will Be the King of the Summer Box Office?

While the summer box office season keeps expanding further and further outside of the summer months, major studios still tend to release their biggest films of the year during this time. With the monumental Marvel film, Avengers: Endgame, out of the way, there are many contenders to take the crown. Let’s look at the field and talk about their odds, shall we?

According to SBD, there are nine films against one another for the largest opening weekend of the summer. It’s important to note that it’s an opening weekend number, not the overall box office. Some of these titans may collapse after their opening weekend while others might hold on strong. With that being said, here’s what SBD has as a prediction:

The Lion King +300
Spider-Man: Far From Home +400
Fast and Furious Presents Hobbs and Shaw +500
Toy Story 4 +600
Once Upon a Time in Hollywood +1000
Rocketman +1200
Dark Phoenix +1400
Men in Black +1600
Godzilla: King of Monsters +2000

Looking at the top 3, it’s a fun note that two of them are Disney owned; I think we can all agree that Disney will be the big winner this year. The Lion King will be the Mouse House’s 12th live action remake (without live action characters, oddly enough) and hype is high. For one, it’s arguably one of Disney’s best animated films. It’s being helmed by Jon Favreau, who has already proven himself with his live-action adaptation of The Jungle Book. The film is also old enough that children who watched it when it was new are now adults and can show their children the film. That being said, can it really beat Marvel? After Endgame, fans are clamoring for more from the franchise. While it’s still in Phase Three, it’s the first film to deal with the aftermath of the Infinity War saga. So what’s next? As for Fast and Furious, it’s the first spin-off film featuring fan favorite characters. There’s always an audience for these films. It will be interesting to see if it does better than Toy Story 4, though.

Moving to the bottom three, they make sense as there doesn’t seem to be an overall large interest in them. However, Dark Phoenix is in an interesting predicament. It’s been through production hell and moved release dates multiple times. It’s also a continuation of X-Men: Apocalypse, which did worse at the box office than the other franchises listed in the bottom three. It’s also essentially a remake of a film they had already done, X-Men: The Last Stand. At the same time, it’s the (second to) last X-Men film from Fox before it’s purchase by Disney. Are fans going to come out in force to see this? It will be interesting to see. Men in Black is a rebooted franchise so it could go either way with fans. As for Godzilla: King of the Monsters, this gargantuan film could either exceed expectations at the box office or flop as it’s being predicted. It is the first film out of the gates in this list so you never know!

There you have it – summer’s biggest box office films ready to rock your world. Which are you ready for?